Websites were shut after coup rumours but only when the damage had been done, writes CLIFFORD COONAN
THERE HAVE been arrests – some say a handful, others say many – a number of websites have been shuttered, while some of the country’s best-loved social media sites have been gagged for circulating rumours of a coup during the worst political crisis in decades in China.
The ruling Communist Party has been locked in a power struggle between mild reformers and hardliners for weeks now, ever since a purge that saw rising star Bo Xilai, populist party boss in Chongqing, cast into the political wilderness.
The purge prompted a wide outpouring of speculation on social media sites, leading to unprecedented speculation about power-play and coups.
There were tales of battalions of troops being deployed at the city’s edge, of gunshots and tanks near the leadership’s hallowed HQ, Zhongnanhai compound.
The reports turned out to be untrue: the photos were old, and there is no evidence of any coup, but the speculation itself was damaging.
These machinations previously would go on behind closed doors, and a cowed media would never dream of reporting such things. After years spent carefully muzzling the traditional media, the party is now struggling to contain activity on social media sites such as Weibo, the Chinese equivalent of (banned) Twitter.
Meanwhile, there is growing interest in the case of Neil Heywood, the Briton whose death in China has been linked to the purge of Mr Bo, and much of the speculation is now focused on Mr Bo’s wife Gu Kailai, a business associate of Heywood.
Mr Bo had seemed set for a place on the all-powerful Politburo Standing Committee but this all changed when his former right-hand man and police chief Wang Lijun tried to defect to the United States at the Chengdu consulate in a dramatic event that remains shrouded in mystery.
At least some of the information that Mr Wang offered the US consulate in Chengdu when he sought asylum appears to relate to the case of Mr Heywood, who had claimed to be worried about his safety because he had fallen out with Ms Gu, the Wall Street Journal reported. She is said to be under house arrest.
There are plenty of mysterious elements. A story headlined “Beijing arrests 1,000 in internet crime crackdown” on the official, state-run Xinhua news agency was deleted.
Xinhua did report how authorities had shut 16 websites and detained six people for "fabricating or disseminating online rumours". The websites, including meizhou.net, xn528.comand cndy.com.cn, were closed for spreading rumours of "military vehicles entering Beijing and something wrong going on in Beijing", said a spokesman for the State Internet Information Office (SIIO), adding that the coup rumours were fabricated by "some lawless people recently". The rumours have caused "a very bad influence on the public" and the websites were closed in accordance with laws for failing to stop the spread of rumours, said the spokesman.
A report quoted police saying that an undisclosed number of people who had disseminated similar rumours on the internet, but who had repented, were “admonished and educated”.
Microblogging sites weibo.comand t.qq.comhave been "criticised and punished accordingly", said authorities.
Beijing police urged internet users to abide by laws and be vigilant against online rumours, which “severely disturb the public order, undermine social stability and deserve punishment”. People seem prepared to risk censure to discuss their views, but a recent ruling requiring Weibo users to register their real names will have put people under a lot more pressure than usual.